BATON ROUGE, La. (4/14/17) – The Arkansas State women's bowling team went 1-1 during the bracket portion of play Friday afternoon after earning the sixth seed in the tournament after going 1-1 earlier today in the final two matches of the qualifying round at the Raising Canes River Center in Baton Rouge.

The Red Wolves (86-37) faced third-seeded Stephen F. Austin in the first match of the double-elimination bracket and fell behind 1-0 with a 200-179 loss. A-State won game two 245-203, but lost game three 238-175 to trail by a 2-1 count. Arkansas State won a low-scoring game four 172-164 to even things up but fell behind 3-2 after a 191-173 loss in game five. However, the Red Wolves won game six 204-194 to force a decisive game seven and won the game 221-160 to clinch a 4-3 win over the Ladyjacks.

A-State advanced to play Vanderbilt, who won 4-2 over Maryland Eastern Shore, but fell behind 2-0 to the Commodores with a 223-160 and 220-215 pair of setbacks. However, the Red Wolves stormed back to tie the match 2-2 with 234-202 and 219-178 wins in games three and four, respectively. However, Vanderbilt responded with an impressive 290-192 win in game five and won the match 4-2 with a game six 201-185 victory.

“I'm very proud of the team for coming back and defeating Stephen F. Austin,” A-State women's bowling coach Justin Kostick said. “They're the defending national champions so they know how to win here so it was great for us to come back from down 3-2. Then we played Vandy and all the credit to them. They had a 290 game and bowled well throughout the match. They deserved to win.”

The Red Wolves return Saturday to play Sam Houston State in an elimination match at 8:30 a.m. The other elimination match will put Nebraska against Maryland Eastern Shore. Stephen F. Austin and Fairleigh Dickinson were both eliminated today. McKendree and Vanderbilt are the two teams that are 2-0 in the event.

A-State dropped its first match of the day and sixth overall qualifying match to Maryland Eastern Shore by a score of 1,008-997 with Jadee Scott-Jones posting a 255 to lead the team. The Red Wolves then rebounded to defeat Sam Houston State 983-938 with Jordan Richard leading the team with a 215 and Nicole Mikaelian a 209.

Scott-Jones finished fifth overall in the individual standings with a 212.4 average, while Richard was 12th with a 208.2 average.

All of the action prior to the championship final is being streamed online at NCAA.com with the final set to be aired on ESPNU April 15 at 5:30 p.m.

Fans can keep up with the Arkansas State women's bowling team by following the squad on Twitter (@AStateBowling) and by liking the Arkansas State Women's Bowling page on Facebook.